


Unexpected Places

by LysanderandHermia



Series: Pet!Verse [4]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Conditioning, D/s lifestyle, Jealousy, M/M, Multi, People as Pets, Recovery, Stockholm Syndrome, bad relationships, do not model anything in ur life off of this seriously, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2016-09-13
Packaged: 2018-08-14 21:50:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8030098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LysanderandHermia/pseuds/LysanderandHermia
Summary: Jim allows him coffee now, once a day. He likes cleaning the dishes; they make him feel productive but don’t exhaust him. Head pets have become a regular part of the evening, as well as cuddling. He still gets in trouble, and that, for some bizarre reason, makes Sebastian feel more settled than anything else. He cooks, he cleans, he is happy in how quickly things feel like they’ve gone back to normal, with added benefits of Jim still doling out extra perks almost daily.





	Unexpected Places

**Author's Note:**

  * For [poetofthefall](https://archiveofourown.org/users/poetofthefall/gifts), [missingknome](https://archiveofourown.org/users/missingknome/gifts).



> I'm feeling weirdly tender about posting this?? I think because I haven't written this verse in a while and I don't know if I had my head fully wrapped around everything when I wrote it, but muse struck.
> 
> For poetofthefall's prompt - "In Unexpected Places"
> 
> also for missingknome, because I just found their comment yesterday and it made me glow with the force of a thousand suns and I was extremely flattered! I hope this was something like you were imagining.

The following week after being locked in the basement is hard, but Sebastian Moran is strong, and slowly starts to recover and find his balance again. 

Jim allows him coffee now, once a day. He likes cleaning the dishes; they make him feel productive but don’t exhaust him. Head pets have become a regular part of the evening, as well as cuddling. He still gets in trouble, and that, for some bizarre reason, makes Sebastian feel more settled than anything else. He cooks, he cleans, he is happy in how quickly things feel like they’ve gone back to normal, with added benefits of Jim still doling out extra perks almost daily.

It’s unusual, then, when he wakes up one morning to hear angry yelling, and Sebastian is terrified all over again, cowering on the floor before he can think. He realizes after a moment, though, that Dmitri’s name is thrown in amongst the anger, and with morbid curiosity, he moves to the bedroom door, peering out into the hallway.

Dmitri is getting kicked by Jim, howling in pain - he’s never had a high pain tolerance - and as Jim gets another good shoe just under Dmitri’s ribs, the other man gasps soundlessly, the wind knocked out of him, and then his head lolls, passing out from a mixture of pain and breathlessness. Sebastian stares, mouth hanging open, and Jim turns to glare at Sebastian, snapping a, “What the fuck are you looking at?” at him, before he can catch himself. Sebastian ducks away, backing away in the room and from the door. He holds up his hands placatingly as Jim storms into the room, his fist already raised, but freezes when he sees Sebastian’s posture.

Something about it calms Jim down, and instead, Jim sighs, rubbing his face, and leans down to press his forehead to Sebastian’s, fingers curling around his hair. “Good boy,” he breathes, “Stay put, I’ll be back in a while.”

The ex-soldier sits in a confused and terrified lump as he hears Jim rouse Dmitri from the hallway, hears him get the man on his feet, and then take him out of the flat, cooing at Dmitri the entire time. Sebastian can’t remember the last time one of them actually left the house. Why are they leaving?

After twenty minutes, he dares to venture outside of the bedroom. He has no idea where Jim has taken Dmitri, no idea when they’ll be back, but wants to feel like he can ask when they do get back. So he cleans. He dusts, he reorganizes, he vacuums, he scrubs the kitchen. It’s a few hours later, when he has hesitantly decided to allow himself a break and has been curled on the couch for a half hour or so when he hears the lock clicking at the front door, and hurries to his spot, kneeling patiently as Jim and Dmitri come back in. 

He notices Dmitri immediately, an ice pack held to his eye where it’s swollen, and butterfly plasters on his face where his cheek split open. His arm has a splint on it, and Sebastian is willing to bet he has more bandages around his chest and ribs. Something green and spiky rises up in his chest. “You went to the doctor?” He asks, unable to hide the complete disbelief in his voice as he stares from Dmitri to Jim, shock overriding his usual demeanour and the worry of consequences to come. 

Dmitri looks like he’s been crying a good part of the time they’ve been gone, and Jim slides a soothing hand over his back, resting at the base of his spine. “Yes, we went to the doctor. I was worried I’d broken something,” Jim says, and there’s gentleness and regret there.

The green ball rears its ugly head again and Sebastian can’t help but reach up and touch at his own eye, still awful and yellow and tender from where Jim had landed a punch a week ago, “You didn’t take me to the doctor,” Sebastian says, and it sounds like a complaint, but really, he’s just upset. Why did Dmitri get to go and he didn’t?

The answer his traitorous mind supplies isn’t one he likes. Not at all. He shrinks back before Jim can say anything or even throw an exasperated glare his way, just shuffles back towards the bedroom, his next intended cleaning target. “I cleaned, sir,” he tells the man, over his shoulder, dismissive, anger making him far bolder than he should be. 

Jim catches up to him in the bedroom, grabbing his hair firmly and guiding Sebastian to the bed with it, sitting down and pointing at his feet. Sebastian kneels there dutifully, eyes swimming already. He knows he’s in trouble, and right now, he doesn’t care. He’s not going to choke on his words this time, not like last time, when he didn’t speak up for himself. It’s not fair this time either, and he’s going to make it known.

“I don’t like the way you just spoke to me,” Jim says, after a moment, his words icy, and Sebastian doesn’t respond until the hand still in his hair tightens incrementally.

“You didn’t take me to the doctor,” Sebastian repeats, and puts a name to the green ball in his chest. Jealousy. 

“No, I didn’t.” Jim is silent for a moment, searching Sebastian’s face, before frowning. “You’re angry.”

Sebastian manages to level a warbly glare at Jim, and grits his teeth, knowing it will piss off Jim for reminding him of a span of days they’d both rather forget. “You hit me more than you did Dmitri. I have cracked if not broken ribs, and you know it. You locked me in the basement, and then everything’s just fine again, and it is, but...” He feels the tears spill over, and he lets out the next words around a sad noise, “Do you love him more than me? Is that why he gets treated better? I was here first, Jim, I try so hard to be good, and I don’t understand it no matter how hard I try. Why do you love him more? Why can’t you love me just as much?”

Jim does look angry, but also hurt, and he sighs, drawing Sebastian up into his arms, “Oh, tiger,” he murmurs against Sebastian’s ear, “I’ve done so much damage, haven’t I? I don’t love Demmi more than you, darling. I love him differently. He’s fragile, more fragile than you, you know that. I have to take care of him in a different way. I have to be gentler with him.” He falls silent, and pulls back, tracing his thumb underneath the yellow fading bruise on Sebastian’s eye, wiping away a few tears, “I should have taken you too. But you’re stronger than Dmitri, you can handle it when I’m harsher with you. You’re my beautiful strong Tiger, aren’t you?”

He smiles at Sebastian, and Sebastian has to sniff a few times and scrub his eyes clear of wetness, but eventually, he manages to smile back. Maybe Jim does love Dmitri more, maybe he doesn’t and he’s telling the truth, and maybe he shouldn’t accept the answer and how simplistically obvious it sounds when it shouldn’t, but Sebastian decides he’ll take comfort from the moment, and even more unexpected places, whenever and wherever he can.


End file.
